Hay and district
In Victorian times
  Making way for Castle Square  
 

The building in the middle of this photograph, with the sign for 'Evans - Saddler', and the building beyond it were both knocked Saddlery advertisementdown around 1885. This business survived nearby, though (see right).
This scene was at the end of Castle Street, near the junction with High Town. The site of these lost buildings became part of Castle Square, which is now in use as a car park.

An advertisement for
Evans the Saddler from
a business directory
printed in 1895.
Note the extra business
in leather drive belts
for Victorian machinery.
Castle Street
Hay
around
1880
Castle Street, 1880s
Photograph
with thanks to
Eric Lewis Pugh
of Hay
 

The line of children in this picture almost look as Castle Squareif they were being led across the street by a 'lollipop lady' !
In fact there wasn't enough traffic to need them before 1885, and what traffic there was was pretty slow, especially on streets as narrow as these !

In the 1999 photograph shown here you can recognise the shop on the left in both pictures, and the old wall on the right. The top of the old town hall building in the middle of the new picture (behind the coloured flags) can be seen above the lost buildings in the Victorian photograph.

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